Rating: 
Summary: The good news is, this is the BEST BizTalk book available...
Review: -The bad news is, this is the ONLY BizTalk Book available. The book is "OK" but the bulk of the book is about XML. It's an easy read for a geek, but doesn't get very specific or deep into BizTalk Technologies. Still, readinq it is quicker than playing around with the jumpstart kit. I hope somebody writes an "in depth" BizTalk book soon !
Rating: 
Summary: Useful book for understanding the BizTalk Initiative
Review: BizTalk is a challenging topic. This book is intended to demystify the subject, to provide a business/management summary of the goals and business value of the BizTalk Initiative. It is not intended for developers or architects - those books are coming... it provides a primer that allows an understanding of the topic before diving into the technical detail further. Let us know what you think.
Rating: 
Summary: Developers, don't waste your time
Review: Here's the deal from a developers viewpoint. 1) The book is about the MS Commerce Server 2000. So if you have the quickstart kit, forget this book. And since I cannot get my hands on an alpha or beta of Commerce 2000, it is mostly useless. Here's 2 key points that will save you the bucks; Commerce 2000 has a catalog API (COM) built on XML and BizTalk is tightly integrated into Commerce 2000. You now owe me the cost of this book! 2) It's an overview book plain and simple. If you are a developer like me and hope to get real info on techniques, or even examples, forget it. There are just about no examples in this book (none of any use). The kit eclipses this book in examples. 3) If there are things that are unclear in the quickstart kit, they will remain unclear after you read the book. And by the way, it is a thin book. And it is clear that they stretched the contents (you developers know what I mean). But I will say that if you have no idea what BizTalk is and you are a manager not a developer, this book would be of value.
Rating:
Summary: Just an introduction to what XML can do for e-commerce
Review: The authors present the very early stages of the Biztalk Initiative in an easy to digest format. While it is light on details, it does give the reader enough basics to understand how XML and Microsoft's solution of it for e-commerce will go forward in Windows 2000. Most of the information will change rapidly as the product matures, but you can get your feet wet here and prepare your own ideas on possible implementations.
Rating:
Summary: A very shallow presentation
Review: The authors spend a great deal of time (and many pages) going over XML under the guise of preparing the reader to understand the underpinnings of BizTalk. In reality, they're clearly just filling out the book. They then touch upon BizTalk itself in as shallow a manner as possible, after which they switch to talking about the BackOffice 2000 offerings that will interact with the BizTalk Server. Again, the BackOffice products are covered with incredible shallowness. The case study at the end is more of the same - basically, the user wanted openness and flexibility, so they used XML and BizTalk. Again, no real details. Unfortunately, there is very little out yet about the BizTalk server. Even so, only the most uniformed managers will learn much new from this book. ....
Rating:
Summary: Based on alpha version of Biztalk Server
Review: The book is a good introduction to Biztalk and Biztalk Server 2000. It could be good course material for a Biztalk Server Lab. Anyway this book is based on the alpha version of Biztalk Server 2000, it includes photos that doesn't reflect the final product. The book life is very short.
Rating: 
Summary: Just a brief Introduction to Biztalk
Review: This book come little bit too early. So those tiny information about Biztalk could only cover the JumpStart Kit, instead of a "more complete" Technology Preview / Alpha Version. This book is only for those who need a really quick and high-level introduction on what's Biztalk for. It's not for developers.
Rating:
Summary: Just a brief Introduction to Biztalk
Review: This book come little bit too early. So those tiny information about Biztalk could only cover the JumpStart Kit, instead of a "more complete" Technology Preview / Alpha Version. This book is only for those who need a really quick and high-level introduction on what's Biztalk for. It's not for developers.
Rating:
Summary: Just a brief Introduction to Biztalk
Review: This book come little bit too early. So those tiny information about Biztalk could only cover the JumpStart Kit, instead of a "more complete" Technology Preview / Alpha Version. This book is only for those who need a really quick and high-level introduction on what's Biztalk for. It's not for developers.
Rating:
Summary: Worthless
Review: This book was written before the BizTalk Server product became available. It's a waste of time and money if you are trying to learn the server product.
| 
